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Monday, November 29, 2010

This is a very noteworthy project that everyone interested in Urban Networks and Urban Systems should take a look at.

It's an interactive application that tracks the commercial ties between most countries across the globe (check it here). It also allows you to compare a variety of socio, demographic and economic indicators on the national level.

It was developed at the University of Amsterdam and it uses data from the CIA World Factbook.

Monday, November 22, 2010

This is a video report by the Brookings Institution on the demographic trends that have affected US metropolitan areas in the 2000s. The study focuses on the metro scale and stresses five demographic trends that are currently undergoing in the US:

Growing fast

Diversifying rapidly

Aging Tsunami

Selectively educating

Divided by income

The video is realy good and the Full Report looks even better. "The State of Metropolitan America: on the front lines of demographic transformation" Download ithere.

Wednesday, November 17, 2010

Ok. I'm now officialy creating a new session here at Urban Demographics Blog. It's called Stupid Measures*. The idea is to highlight measures and indexes constructed in a stupid way or that are simply worthless.

"The index is based on five criteria: the percentage of children ages 5 to 14, for obvious reasons; medianhousehold income, because more money = more candy; the share of people who walk to work, because it’s easier to trick-or-treat in neighborhoods that are walkable; population density, which tells you where there are the most people around to fork over candy corn; and the prevalence of artists, designers and other cultural creatives, since those types tend to get more into the Halloween spirit"

Interesting, right? But still (stupid) worthless.... More about the the Trick-or-Treat Index here. This map below shows the Trick-or-Treat Index calculated for every major U.S. metro area.

Tuesday, November 16, 2010

How to define generational cohorts? The guys from US Today came up with this "generational quiz". It takes just 5 quick questions and it's pretty good (although I'm not sure if its going to help you with your next paper).

"The year you were born partly determines what generation you belong to, but so do your cultural experiences." It identifies 6 different generations: G.I, Silent, Boomer, 'X' (a.k.a. Savvy), Milenial and 'Z'.

ps. I would belong to the Milenial Generation because of my birth year... but it looks like I'm a 'X' according to the quiz result....

Thursday, November 4, 2010

Now at the intraurban-scale: these maps show the Brazilian Election results* by electoral zones for São Paulo e Rio de Janeiro.

Nelson Rojas and Luiz Cesar Ribeiro (from Observatório das Metrópoles) discuss the social polarization over space that emerges from these election results (here, in portuguese). The main conclusions drawn by the authors is that:

The maps of 2010 election results are very similar with the electoral map of 2006 - the last confrontation between the PSDB (right wing) and the PT (left wing); and

In both cities PSDB clearly had more votes in the more affluent urban areas meanwhile PT had an overwhelming victory in the depressed urban areas.

[it looks to me that the "Social Geographies of Votes" at regional and intraurban scales are similar to some extent. As a rule PSDB has the preference of richer araes, PT has the preference of deprived ones]

* ps. update regarding the last post: this is the best map of Brazilian Election results by municipality. It's possible to filter results by GDP, homicide rate, % of population receiving Bolsa Família benefits, etc. (tip from a friend of mine: Mauro Oddo, the best storyteller).

Monday, November 1, 2010

On January 1st Dilma Rousseff will become Brazil’s next president (our first female president!). As The Economist Magazine said: "[...] it was the poor and those in the less-developed northern regions who swung it her way. Richer and better-educated folk preferred Mr Serra, but Brazil has fewer of them." And they are not wrong.

This interactive map shows the Brazilian election results in each municipality (by Folha de São Paulo).

Deadline for abstracts/proposals: 30 december 2011ANPUR is the Brazilian National Association of Graduate Schools and Research on Urban and Regional Planning. The motto of this year's Conference is: Who plans the territory? actors, arenas and strategies. [direct translation].